Soups and First Courses

There’s no doubt that first impressions matter, gastronomically speaking, however one might wish to deny it. The table is laid, the plate is placed before you and, full of expectation, you respond to the appearance and aroma of the dish.

The first course is an introduction or overture to any meal and as such it should impart an obvious, appetising appeal that says ‘eat-me’.

Fortunately, most good food prepared with fresh seasonal ingredients to an appropriate recipe does look attractive: it should not require any additional tweaking on the plate. Teaming how to trap the elusive scent of a herb in one’s cooking takes time. There are some useful guidelines though. It is usually helpful to know the native habitat of culinary herbs. For example, rosemary is a Mediterranean herb that grows wild on the hillsides of Provence. The herb is widely used in the cooking of the region, most notably in the slowly cooked daubes of pork and beef. From this starting point it is interesting to discover how well a sprig of rosemary enhances other casseroled dishes, such as a chicken or beef stew.